Such has massive profit potential. Do you think a for profit company would simply set that aside? Such are not in the business of morality. Don't go to a mercenary camp if you are seeking a temple.
Well there is an obvious difference between offing something that's a deal, fair, a little overpriced and then outright greed bleeding your customers dry with gambling mechanics like loot boxes.
100k on Diablo Immoral... might be a so what to you to me it's downright disgusting.
There is an obvious difference, allowing players to easily distinguish them.
Players are entirely free to play games they feel fair or at least tolerable in their monetization. They are also free to play games which most would consider to have absurd monetization, Either way, the customer determines the amount bled, not the company.
It certainly has the potential to be disgusting. Again, so what?
Many things have that potential, some of which are broadly socially accepted and indulged in by many. Yet the world turns regardless.
Avoiding that you find disgusting is generally feasible and advisable.
I consider 100k spent on DI to be either irrelevant in the case of the extremely rich or indicative of spending issues in the not so rich which any so afflicted should personally address as need be, and otherwise somewhat suggestive of stupidity.
Disgusting, not so much. I reserve that for what I find much more heinous than the unbridled pursuit of wealth though legal means and the customers that indulge it.
I think the challenge is not to the person paying the $100k but rather the low paying folks that believe if they pay just a little bit they have a fair chance. These games launch and the monetization is hidden behind waves of currencies and upgrades so it takes time before that is even revealed.
The guy who spends 100k knows he is spending 100k. The guy who spends $100 has no clue that he is going to be obliterated by a guy literally spending 1000 times more.
Hopefully the unwary will make good use of that learning experience when it comes, and ideally extrapolate it to any other such game encountered.
There has been no attempt to push MMORPG subscription rates higher than the standard, so far as I am aware. Considering the profit seeking nature of their owners that should be pretty telling as to expected success of such an attempt.
B2P/Cosmetics/Expansions is certainly one of the better options in my opinion. Subscription is a preference of mine rather than need. I like having that option, but isn't something I've insisted on so have personal flexibility in that.
In the post you can see he talks of a $3.00 increase. Although I played from 1999 I don't recall the the exact amount of the increase. I do recall the increase but not when and by how much.
I believe you’re correct that when SOE took over EverQuest, the subscription fee went up to $14.99 per month, but prior to that when Verant ran the show, the costs was $9.89 (989 Studios made it, yes?). But it wasn’t without precedent. IIRC, Mythic was the first to break the $10 mark by charging $12.95 per month. Then the rest bumped to $15, and the rest, as they say, is history. Look for Warhammer Online to push that monthly charge up again and for future MMOGs to linger around the $20 per month mark in the next year or two.
If you look at the comments in the first link they talk of losing their characters after 90 days. It's no wonder why we all stayed subbed then.
What is going to be a lot harder to do is work out if those price rises led to an increase or decrease in revenue down the line. If KnightFalz is right the increase would have resulted in player loses that meant that no overall increase in revenue occurred. There would have been an immediate up tick but long term it would have not been a gain.
Considering how players drop of anyway working out the situation a year after the sub increase is really tricky. What we can say is it has been tried and if it was a success would not those studios have stuck with the idea? But I do wonder about "player perception", the sub was seen as costing while F2P was "free". We know F2P was not of course, just because many even the baulk played for free does not mean the game was free. Whales and dolphins were paying for it.
I think it is quite possible that even in those studios which found raising the sub worked, there was a realisation that the "player perception" tide was turning against the subscription. In the long run further increases of subscription may have been unstainable. What I am not sure is they were correct in that assumption.
I certainly think that if you want a new MMO to be a success the B2P/cosmetic/expansion model would take of faster, a 'subscription only' would be a slow burner (sorry for that Embers pun) that hopefully takes of down the line.
I do agree with you @Scot that B2P with a cash shop for cosmetics is the best option for the player.
If you notice from the comments that people were expecting the individual game subs to go up to $20. That did not happen instead it went away. God what I wouldn't give to go back in time and change things but here we are making the best of the poor choices we have.
I generally always pay a sub for every game even if it is F2P. As long as I don't have to deal with the inconveniences or grinds to avoid the F2P drawbacks.
We have to manage what we have today. I do however do not want something the mobile genre has managed to foist upon us unwittingly. The multi tiered multi currency shell game that hides every nefarious gamble behind multiple layers that requires some serious youtuber forensic analysis to uncover. I don't even wish to even play a game these days without examining what is hiding behind door number 6, 7 and 8.
I am not saying it is bleak but it is so player unfriendly and the fact that we convince ourselves well at least we get to play for free as a positive. We are so willing to invest our time which we consider an expendable resource when we should value that above all else.
You can argue and very rightly so that we as players are ultimately responsible for the choices we make in our purchases but how come the companies who disguise all this mumbo jumbo expertly get a pass. Why don't we hold them responsible and instead pile all the responsibility on the player.
I agree with most of what you have said. But when is comes to subscriptions If that were true, can you tell us the name of the MMORPG that raised the sub and that did not work. This is stretching all our memoires I am sure, but I cannot remember a MMO that launched as sub only and then increased the sub (I am sure there must be one), let alone one that went south afterwards.
I would be happy with a MMO where you went round in an old sack until you coughed up the money for a decent outfit.
I think the b2p/cosmetics and periodic purchased expansions is a potential winner myself, it does not have to be subscription. My main argument is that the sell everything and the family silver approach is detrimental to gameplay.
There has been no attempt to push MMORPG subscription rates higher than the standard, so far as I am aware. Considering the profit seeking nature of their owners that should be pretty telling as to expected success of such an attempt.
See EVE, CCP raised sub prices by $5 last year ostensibly to cover the cost of inflation but more likely to make up for the loss of their Russian customers due to the war Ukraine.
Definitely pissed off some (many?) customers, how many no one knows, but just recently they released 13 staff, so my guess is revenues were down quite a bit from the change.
As for being happy going around wearing an old sack until one pays for a new outfit for cash, see POE. (Not really a MMO, I know).
In POE I spent over $100 on inventory tabs /organizers and paid for a couple of outfits which cost about $40 each (unless they were on sale) but the best looking outfit sets easy cost up to $400 - $700.
Oh yeah, did you want some weapon skins? $15 -$25. Dual wield a pair of the same swords? (Cyclone builds were meta that season) You had to purchase the same skin twice ....
I went into POE thinking it had a "fair" monetization model but I found it to be one of the more predatory and disagreeable ones as there really were no good in game costumes / inventory tabs obtainable strictly from game play.
Just trying to live long enough to play a new, released MMORPG, playing New Worlds atm
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Runescape also upped their subscription prices not too long ago. I'd expect the major games to go up to $19.99/mo in the next year or two. New customers aren't being attracted, best way to get more money is to squeeze the ones you already have.
Many of the people subscribed are there regardless of a price hike, look at Netflix that costs something like 5x now than when it originally launched. Also tends to have significantly worse programming overall now that many networks pulled out and their original content is 99% crap that gets canceled in a season.
kitarad said: If you notice from the comments that people were expecting the individual game subs to go up to $20. That did not happen instead it went away. God what I wouldn't give to go back in time and change things but here we are making the best of the poor choices we have.
It didn't happen because there was no need, the massive influx of new players into the genre increased overall profits without having to charge more individually. Same reason video games didn't have to raise their prices: market size was increasing massively each year(also things like no more massive brick & mortar cut.)
Everquest's $9/month was significantly cheaper than what I paid to play MUDs years earlier. Why? More customers. Also a bit of early computer owners being on the more rich side, definitely were not a common household item at the time. Man, I wish I had an Amiga as a kid...
Dragon's Gate was, IIRC, about $5 an hour. They had one player who spent over $1000 a month for the entire first year of its launch.
The monthly fee could be $150 and they'd still be trying to squeeze more out of you with cash shops. These companies aren't your friends.
I also think that I'm not wrong about the disgusting predatory tactics, unregulated gambling with loot boxes, taking advantage of people, and every other dirty underhanded trick these greedy companies are using to make money.
So you opine and many feel accordingly.
I disagree in that I think that interpretation improperly embellishes the role of the provider in such things while diminishing that of the consumer.
Such makes it far too easy for consumers to be seen as victims rather than the accomplices they are in this.
This isn't an opinion or feeling. The predatory monetization in video games is a fact.
Online gambling platforms in my state require proof of identification and are not allowed to provide access to those under 21, I see no reason lootboxes and such shouldn't be regulated the same way.
I'm strongly against banning them, but they should not be readily available for children to access, and at the very least be required to follow the same laws as gambling... because it is gambling.
I also think that I'm not wrong about the disgusting predatory tactics, unregulated gambling with loot boxes, taking advantage of people, and every other dirty underhanded trick these greedy companies are using to make money.
So you opine and many feel accordingly.
I disagree in that I think that interpretation improperly embellishes the role of the provider in such things while diminishing that of the consumer.
Such makes it far too easy for consumers to be seen as victims rather than the accomplices they are in this.
This isn't an opinion or feeling. The predatory monetization in video games is a fact.
Are you really going to call kids as young as four years old accomplices rather than victims?
No, clearly from the posted link the parents were the accomplices.
I did agree that game companies should have to send notifications of excessive spending which the buyer can set the limit for, much as my bank cards do.
Just trying to live long enough to play a new, released MMORPG, playing New Worlds atm
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I agree with most of what you have said. But when is comes to subscriptions If that were true, can you tell us the name of the MMORPG that raised the sub and that did not work. This is stretching all our memoires I am sure, but I cannot remember a MMO that launched as sub only and then increased the sub (I am sure there must be one), let alone one that went south afterwards.
I would be happy with a MMO where you went round in an old sack until you coughed up the money for a decent outfit.
I think the b2p/cosmetics and periodic purchased expansions is a potential winner myself, it does not have to be subscription. My main argument is that the sell everything and the family silver approach is detrimental to gameplay.
There has been no attempt to push MMORPG subscription rates higher than the standard, so far as I am aware. Considering the profit seeking nature of their owners that should be pretty telling as to expected success of such an attempt.
See EVE, CCP raised sub prices by $5 last year ostensibly to cover the cost of inflation but more likely to make up for the loss of their Russian customers due to the war Ukraine.
Definitely pissed off some (many?) customers, how many no one knows, but just recently they released 13 staff, so my guess is revenues were down quite a bit from the change.
As for being happy going around wearing an old sack until one pays for a new outfit for cash, see POE. (Not really a MMO, I know).
In POE I spent over $100 on inventory tabs /organizers and paid for a couple of outfits which cost about $40 each (unless they were on sale) but the best looking outfit sets easy cost up to $400 - $700.
Oh yeah, did you want some weapon skins? $15 -$25. Dual wield a pair of the same swords? (Cyclone builds were meta that season) You had to purchase the same skin twice ....
I went into POE thinking it had a "fair" monetization model but I found it to be one of the more predatory and disagreeable ones as there really were no good in game costumes / inventory tabs obtainable strictly from game play.
I was unaware EVE had done that. Thanks for that information. It will be interesting to see how that eventually works out for them in the long run. It is somewhat unique so that may give them some leeway in that. If it ends out fine for them it may cause others to try the same.
To me the lacking default inventory of PoE and the high demand placed upon due to other design choices is a good example of problem creation for the sake of selling the solution. Purchasing adequate inventory alone seemed as though it wouldn't be too bad to me in comparison to buying an ARPG and expansion that often follows, but cosmetics as well would push it far beyond with what they charge.
As it turned out I wasn't all that keen on it so it didn't cost me anything, but the prices you mention show it could get pretty crazy compared to it's PC fellows at least as of now. I am thinking though D4 may go at least somewhat down that path as well.
I also think that I'm not wrong about the disgusting predatory tactics, unregulated gambling with loot boxes, taking advantage of people, and every other dirty underhanded trick these greedy companies are using to make money.
So you opine and many feel accordingly.
I disagree in that I think that interpretation improperly embellishes the role of the provider in such things while diminishing that of the consumer.
Such makes it far too easy for consumers to be seen as victims rather than the accomplices they are in this.
This isn't an opinion or feeling. The predatory monetization in video games is a fact.
Are you really going to call kids as young as four years old accomplices rather than victims?
No, clearly from the posted link the parents were the accomplices.
I did agree that game companies should have to send notifications of excessive spending which the buyer can set the limit for, much as my bank cards do.
Right which means these companies targeted kids who were victims.
"You CAN'T buy ships for RL money." - MaxBacon
"classification of games into MMOs is not by rational reasoning" - nariusseldon
Everyone involved other than the child is to blame. The parents, the developers, and the lack of any regulation preventing the targeting of children by predatory businesses.
You may blame a dog for eating a steak when left alone, but you still chose to leave the dog alone with a steak!
Regulations are not a substitution for parenting, but they are still worth having.
Runescape also upped their subscription prices not too long ago. I'd expect the major games to go up to $19.99/mo in the next year or two. New customers aren't being attracted, best way to get more money is to squeeze the ones you already have.
They did, but didn't go over the standard rate when doing so. Population isn't something RuneScape has a problem with so far as I'm aware.
Everyone involved other than the child is to blame. The parents, the developers, and the lack of any regulation preventing the targeting of children by predatory businesses.
You may blame a dog for eating a steak when left alone, but you still chose to leave the dog alone with a steak!
Regulations are not a substitution for parenting, but they are still worth having.
The degree of culpability is not even remotely the same when one party is using sophisticated. manipulative, sleazy techniques to extract money from the unsuspecting, and the parent's and regulator's culpability is simply in not being aware enough about the tricks to be able to effectively mitigate the danger.
The difference is so pronounced that even mentioning the culpability of those who did not mitigate wisely is just an irrelevant red herring.
If anyone in gaming is complicit, it's the gamer apologists who want to give the companies a partial or total pass in the name of unregulated free enterprise not those who got duped.
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“Microtransactions? In a single player role-playing game? Are you nuts?” ― CD PROJEKT RED
I also think that I'm not wrong about the disgusting predatory tactics, unregulated gambling with loot boxes, taking advantage of people, and every other dirty underhanded trick these greedy companies are using to make money.
So you opine and many feel accordingly.
I disagree in that I think that interpretation improperly embellishes the role of the provider in such things while diminishing that of the consumer.
Such makes it far too easy for consumers to be seen as victims rather than the accomplices they are in this.
This isn't an opinion or feeling. The predatory monetization in video games is a fact.
Are you really going to call kids as young as four years old accomplices rather than victims?
It's an opinion.
That some parents don't control the spending of their children is not a predatory marketing issue. It is a parenting issue.
Four year old children don't have money to spend. If in some way a child of that age managed to trigger a purchase it is again a parenting issue.
Also, linking an article about whether parental controls are sufficient doesn't an argument make in terms of whether the marketing is predatory. It is a separate issue.
Everyone involved other than the child is to blame. The parents, the developers, and the lack of any regulation preventing the targeting of children by predatory businesses.
You may blame a dog for eating a steak when left alone, but you still chose to leave the dog alone with a steak!
Regulations are not a substitution for parenting, but they are still worth having.
The degree of culpability is not even remotely the same when one party is using sophisticated. manipulative, sleazy techniques to extract money from the unsuspecting, and the parent's and regulator's culpability is simply in not being aware enough about the tricks to be able to effectively mitigate the danger.
The difference is so pronounced that even mentioning the culpability of those who did not mitigate wisely is just an irrelevant red herring.
If anyone in gaming is complicit, it's the gamer apologists who want to give the companies a partial or total pass in the name of unregulated free enterprise not those who got duped.
I also think that I'm not wrong about the disgusting predatory tactics, unregulated gambling with loot boxes, taking advantage of people, and every other dirty underhanded trick these greedy companies are using to make money.
So you opine and many feel accordingly.
I disagree in that I think that interpretation improperly embellishes the role of the provider in such things while diminishing that of the consumer.
Such makes it far too easy for consumers to be seen as victims rather than the accomplices they are in this.
This isn't an opinion or feeling. The predatory monetization in video games is a fact.
Are you really going to call kids as young as four years old accomplices rather than victims?
No, clearly from the posted link the parents were the accomplices.
I did agree that game companies should have to send notifications of excessive spending which the buyer can set the limit for, much as my bank cards do.
Such a notice would be helpful in parents doing their job of supervising the conduct of their own children.
Drug use in kids under 18 is a parenting issue. So we should just ignore the dealers and focus on the parents. That’s the equivalent argument some are making.
In reality, whether a parent is doing a poor job is quite a separate issue from whether these companies are intentionally targeting and exploiting kids. Both can be true but that doesn’t mean we ignore the company’s role.
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Drug use in kids under 18 is a parenting issue. So we should just ignore the dealers and focus on the parents. That’s the equivalent argument some are making.
In reality, whether a parent is doing a poor job is quite a separate issue from whether these companies are intentionally targeting and exploiting kids. Both can be true but that doesn’t mean we ignore the company’s role.
I am not making the false equivalence you contend.
In reality poor parental control is what allows children to have access to and spend large amounts of money on anything, and can contribute to their delinquency otherwise.
I agree with most of what you have said. But when is comes to subscriptions If that were true, can you tell us the name of the MMORPG that raised the sub and that did not work. This is stretching all our memoires I am sure, but I cannot remember a MMO that launched as sub only and then increased the sub (I am sure there must be one), let alone one that went south afterwards.
I would be happy with a MMO where you went round in an old sack until you coughed up the money for a decent outfit.
I think the b2p/cosmetics and periodic purchased expansions is a potential winner myself, it does not have to be subscription. My main argument is that the sell everything and the family silver approach is detrimental to gameplay.
There has been no attempt to push MMORPG subscription rates higher than the standard, so far as I am aware. Considering the profit seeking nature of their owners that should be pretty telling as to expected success of such an attempt.
See EVE, CCP raised sub prices by $5 last year ostensibly to cover the cost of inflation but more likely to make up for the loss of their Russian customers due to the war Ukraine.
Definitely pissed off some (many?) customers, how many no one knows, but just recently they released 13 staff, so my guess is revenues were down quite a bit from the change.
As for being happy going around wearing an old sack until one pays for a new outfit for cash, see POE. (Not really a MMO, I know).
In POE I spent over $100 on inventory tabs /organizers and paid for a couple of outfits which cost about $40 each (unless they were on sale) but the best looking outfit sets easy cost up to $400 - $700.
Oh yeah, did you want some weapon skins? $15 -$25. Dual wield a pair of the same swords? (Cyclone builds were meta that season) You had to purchase the same skin twice ....
I went into POE thinking it had a "fair" monetization model but I found it to be one of the more predatory and disagreeable ones as there really were no good in game costumes / inventory tabs obtainable strictly from game play.
Paying for "convenience" should be in the like worded convenience, I would say that you should be able to get out of that old sack for £5, but costumes going up to £100 would not faze me. As long as you don't have to pay for through the nose to look decent, silly money for outfits is fine.
Drug use in kids under 18 is a parenting issue. So we should just ignore the dealers and focus on the parents. That’s the equivalent argument some are making.
In reality, whether a parent is doing a poor job is quite a separate issue from whether these companies are intentionally targeting and exploiting kids. Both can be true but that doesn’t mean we ignore the company’s role.
I am not making the false equivalence you contend.
In reality poor parental control is what allows children to have access to and spend large amounts of money on anything, and can contribute to their delinquency otherwise.
In reality poor parenting is what allows children to have access to environments where drug use is rampant and can contribute to their delinquency.
Again- Meaningless.
That doesn't mean that you do not address drug dealers/company
All time classic MY NEW FAVORITE POST! (Keep laying those bricks)
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Runescape also upped their subscription prices not too long ago. I'd expect the major games to go up to $19.99/mo in the next year or two. New customers aren't being attracted, best way to get more money is to squeeze the ones you already have.
Many of the people subscribed are there regardless of a price hike, look at Netflix that costs something like 5x now than when it originally launched. Also tends to have significantly worse programming overall now that many networks pulled out and their original content is 99% crap that gets canceled in a season.
This is what I think may have been the deciding factor, back in the day the old school MMOs must have thought new players were as important as current ones so they dropped the sub only model. But if you are reasonably sure you will only get a trickle of new players, scaring them of is not an issue, especially if you have a loyal player base who will stick with you.
Drug use in kids under 18 is a parenting issue. So we should just ignore the dealers and focus on the parents. That’s the equivalent argument some are making.
In reality, whether a parent is doing a poor job is quite a separate issue from whether these companies are intentionally targeting and exploiting kids. Both can be true but that doesn’t mean we ignore the company’s role.
I am not making the false equivalence you contend.
In reality poor parental control is what allows children to have access to and spend large amounts of money on anything, and can contribute to their delinquency otherwise.
Why is it that whenever the subject of predatory monetization in games that target children are brought up some of you always want to talk about parenting?
It's like having a discussion about Rohypnol's use as a date rape drug and you wanting to talk about women's fashion instead.
Maybe not quite that creepy but definitely in the ballpark.
"Social media gives legions of idiots the right to speak when they once only spoke at a bar after a glass of wine, without harming the community ... but now they have the same right to speak as a Nobel Prize winner. It's the invasion of the idiots”
― Umberto Eco
“Microtransactions? In a single player role-playing game? Are you nuts?” ― CD PROJEKT RED
Drug use in kids under 18 is a parenting issue. So we should just ignore the dealers and focus on the parents. That’s the equivalent argument some are making.
In reality, whether a parent is doing a poor job is quite a separate issue from whether these companies are intentionally targeting and exploiting kids. Both can be true but that doesn’t mean we ignore the company’s role.
I am not making the false equivalence you contend.
In reality poor parental control is what allows children to have access to and spend large amounts of money on anything, and can contribute to their delinquency otherwise.
If someone gives their credit card to a casino it doesn't matter how bad their parenting is the casino isn't going to let four year old's run around in it gambling. Let alone have the casino specifically target these unsuspecting kids with predatory monetization.
Yet that's exactly what these gaming companies are doing they make it easy enough for a four year old to gamble online.
"You CAN'T buy ships for RL money." - MaxBacon
"classification of games into MMOs is not by rational reasoning" - nariusseldon
Comments
Hopefully the unwary will make good use of that learning experience when it comes, and ideally extrapolate it to any other such game encountered.
Considering how players drop of anyway working out the situation a year after the sub increase is really tricky. What we can say is it has been tried and if it was a success would not those studios have stuck with the idea? But I do wonder about "player perception", the sub was seen as costing while F2P was "free". We know F2P was not of course, just because many even the baulk played for free does not mean the game was free. Whales and dolphins were paying for it.
I think it is quite possible that even in those studios which found raising the sub worked, there was a realisation that the "player perception" tide was turning against the subscription. In the long run further increases of subscription may have been unstainable. What I am not sure is they were correct in that assumption.
I certainly think that if you want a new MMO to be a success the B2P/cosmetic/expansion model would take of faster, a 'subscription only' would be a slow burner (sorry for that Embers pun) that hopefully takes of down the line.
If you notice from the comments that people were expecting the individual game subs to go up to $20. That did not happen instead it went away. God what I wouldn't give to go back in time and change things but here we are making the best of the poor choices we have.
I generally always pay a sub for every game even if it is F2P. As long as I don't have to deal with the inconveniences or grinds to avoid the F2P drawbacks.
We have to manage what we have today. I do however do not want something the mobile genre has managed to foist upon us unwittingly. The multi tiered multi currency shell game that hides every nefarious gamble behind multiple layers that requires some serious youtuber forensic analysis to uncover. I don't even wish to even play a game these days without examining what is hiding behind door number 6, 7 and 8.
I am not saying it is bleak but it is so player unfriendly and the fact that we convince ourselves well at least we get to play for free as a positive. We are so willing to invest our time which we consider an expendable resource when we should value that above all else.
You can argue and very rightly so that we as players are ultimately responsible for the choices we make in our purchases but how come the companies who disguise all this mumbo jumbo expertly get a pass. Why don't we hold them responsible and instead pile all the responsibility on the player.
Definitely pissed off some (many?) customers, how many no one knows, but just recently they released 13 staff, so my guess is revenues were down quite a bit from the change.
As for being happy going around wearing an old sack until one pays for a new outfit for cash, see POE. (Not really a MMO, I know).
In POE I spent over $100 on inventory tabs /organizers and paid for a couple of outfits which cost about $40 each (unless they were on sale) but the best looking outfit sets easy cost up to $400 - $700.
Oh yeah, did you want some weapon skins? $15 -$25. Dual wield a pair of the same swords? (Cyclone builds were meta that season) You had to purchase the same skin twice ....
I went into POE thinking it had a "fair" monetization model but I found it to be one of the more predatory and disagreeable ones as there really were no good in game costumes / inventory tabs obtainable strictly from game play.
"True friends stab you in the front." | Oscar Wilde
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Just trying to live long enough to play a new, released MMORPG, playing New Worlds atm
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https://www.bbc.com/news/technology-48925623
Are you really going to call kids as young as four years old accomplices rather than victims?
"classification of games into MMOs is not by rational reasoning" - nariusseldon
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Try a MUD today at http://www.mudconnect.com/I did agree that game companies should have to send notifications of excessive spending which the buyer can set the limit for, much as my bank cards do.
"True friends stab you in the front." | Oscar Wilde
"I need to finish" - Christian Wolff: The Accountant
Just trying to live long enough to play a new, released MMORPG, playing New Worlds atm
Fools find no pleasure in understanding but delight in airing their own opinions. Pvbs 18:2, NIV
Don't just play games, inhabit virtual worlds™
"This is the most intelligent, well qualified and articulate response to a post I have ever seen on these forums. It's a shame most people here won't have the attention span to read past the second line." - Anon
I was unaware EVE had done that. Thanks for that information. It will be interesting to see how that eventually works out for them in the long run. It is somewhat unique so that may give them some leeway in that. If it ends out fine for them it may cause others to try the same.
To me the lacking default inventory of PoE and the high demand placed upon due to other design choices is a good example of problem creation for the sake of selling the solution. Purchasing adequate inventory alone seemed as though it wouldn't be too bad to me in comparison to buying an ARPG and expansion that often follows, but cosmetics as well would push it far beyond with what they charge.
As it turned out I wasn't all that keen on it so it didn't cost me anything, but the prices you mention show it could get pretty crazy compared to it's PC fellows at least as of now. I am thinking though D4 may go at least somewhat down that path as well.
"classification of games into MMOs is not by rational reasoning" - nariusseldon
Love Minecraft. And check out my Youtube channel OhCanadaGamer
Try a MUD today at http://www.mudconnect.com/They did, but didn't go over the standard rate when doing so. Population isn't something RuneScape has a problem with so far as I'm aware.
The difference is so pronounced that even mentioning the culpability of those who did not mitigate wisely is just an irrelevant red herring.
If anyone in gaming is complicit, it's the gamer apologists who want to give the companies a partial or total pass in the name of unregulated free enterprise not those who got duped.
“Microtransactions? In a single player role-playing game? Are you nuts?”
― CD PROJEKT RED
It's an opinion.
That some parents don't control the spending of their children is not a predatory marketing issue. It is a parenting issue.
Four year old children don't have money to spend. If in some way a child of that age managed to trigger a purchase it is again a parenting issue.
Also, linking an article about whether parental controls are sufficient doesn't an argument make in terms of whether the marketing is predatory. It is a separate issue.
Such a notice would be helpful in parents doing their job of supervising the conduct of their own children.
That’s the equivalent argument some are making.
In reality, whether a parent is doing a poor job is quite a separate issue from whether these companies are intentionally targeting and exploiting kids. Both can be true but that doesn’t mean we ignore the company’s role.
All time classic MY NEW FAVORITE POST! (Keep laying those bricks)
"I should point out that no other company has shipped out a beta on a disc before this." - Official Mortal Online Lead Community Moderator
Proudly wearing the Harbinger badge since Dec 23, 2017.
Coined the phrase "Role-Playing a Development Team" January 2018
"Oddly Slap is the main reason I stay in these forums." - Mystichaze April 9th 2018
In reality poor parental control is what allows children to have access to and spend large amounts of money on anything, and can contribute to their delinquency otherwise.
Again- Meaningless.
That doesn't mean that you do not address drug dealers/company
All time classic MY NEW FAVORITE POST! (Keep laying those bricks)
"I should point out that no other company has shipped out a beta on a disc before this." - Official Mortal Online Lead Community Moderator
Proudly wearing the Harbinger badge since Dec 23, 2017.
Coined the phrase "Role-Playing a Development Team" January 2018
"Oddly Slap is the main reason I stay in these forums." - Mystichaze April 9th 2018
It's like having a discussion about Rohypnol's use as a date rape drug and you wanting to talk about women's fashion instead.
Maybe not quite that creepy but definitely in the ballpark.
“Microtransactions? In a single player role-playing game? Are you nuts?”
― CD PROJEKT RED
Yet that's exactly what these gaming companies are doing they make it easy enough for a four year old to gamble online.
"classification of games into MMOs is not by rational reasoning" - nariusseldon
Love Minecraft. And check out my Youtube channel OhCanadaGamer
Try a MUD today at http://www.mudconnect.com/